1. When you know you're the best, you can afford to tell it like it is.

2. Only four things really count when making an investment (or buying whole companies if, like Buffett, you have $141bn to spend) - "a business you understand, favourable long-term economics, able and trustworthy management, and a sensible price tag". That's investment, everything else is speculation.

3. Invest this way and you don't need to constantly look for the next "new" thing, with all the risk that necessarily entails.

4. Businesses are run by people and the best people are not necessarily the ones with the flashiest CVs.

5. Even for a super-long-term investor like Buffett, there's always a time to sell.

6. Buffett believes incentivisation of managers on the basis of earnings per share encourages disingenuous, if not downright dishonest, behaviour.

7. Between 2002 and 2007, Buffett notes, the euro appreciated from 95 cents to $1.37, yet the US's trade deficit with Germany widened from $36bn to $45bn, the reverse of what should have happened.

8. Buffett has not lost his eye for witty one-liners which, as usual, make his letters a joy to read.

9. He can see the joke, but Buffett also knows that there is something profoundly wrong at the heart of corporate America.

10. Investors should be realists but the best are optimists too.

via telegraph